Wednesday, August 31, 2016

I am in the midst of writing an article about the diet industry for this lovely
publication and it’s one that will cover many facets of the climate around
weight loss and body image. As I often do when I am looking for a variety of
thoughts on a topic, I posted on my Facebook page, seeking perspectives on the
topic of fat-shaming: Is it justifiable? Is it effective? Although I know this
is a sensitive and provocative topic, I was still unprepared for the outpouring
of very heartfelt and gut-wrenching responses to my general query.

On the thread, people wrote about the deep embarrassment and estrangement they
experienced at the dinner table as their siblings snickered at them for getting
second helpings. People wrote about lingering resentment towards parents, grandparents,
relatives, classmates and others who pointed out their size in a derogatory
way, whether it was intentionally mean-spirited or occurred under the pretext
of being well-intentioned. People wrote about this specific kind of stigmatization
triggering a response of eating in isolation, where they ate tucked away in
their rooms, or fostering a habit of bingeing in the middle of the night with a
carton of ice cream in a darkened kitchen, reinforcing their shame and secrecy around
eating. People wrote about how they avoided physical checkups to not expose
themselves to shaming from their doctors. People wrote about how being demeaned
because of their size as children and teens – sometimes just once, sometimes
persistently – likely resulted in subsequent battles with serious eating
disorders.

Of
the dozens of people who responded and well over one hundred comments, not one
person said that as a result of being “called out” for their weight, something
positive resulted. Yes, this is just anecdotal: Facebook surveys are not done
in a laboratory and I am not a researcher. However, the response is strongly backed
up by the emerging evidence that underscores how ill-advised it to create a
stigma around size, both from the perspective of weight loss and the
psychological damage. Studies on the topic are new but they are consistently
indicating that shaming experiences are associated with decreased motivation
and with the adoption of less
nutritious dietary practices. In other words, when exposed to scolding or
insulting messaging, many people exposed to it adopted the kinds of behaviors
associated with weight gain.

If we know that the act of shaming is not one that offers positive net results,
we will have to admit that disparaging someone based on his or her size is simply
mean. If it’s not effective, what is its other purpose? It may make those who
issue the deriding comments possibly feel superior or helpful, depending on
whether or not they are familiar with or accepting of the research, but make no
mistake, it is not beneficial. Often, the messaging overflows with the misogyny
and objectification of our dominant culture as well, whether it is overtly spoken
or not. In fact, the sexism of our mainstream culture is inextricably and
necessarily intertwined with the rampant culture of body-shaming that surrounds
us. It is estimated that 90% of people struggling with eating disorders are
female and, according to filmmaker
and speaker Dr. Jean Kilbourne, the priming for
disordered thinking around the female body starts young: a survey of fourth
grade girls showed that 80% were on diets. The suicide mortality rate of people
with anorexia is thought to be among the highest of all psychiatric disorders.

We
know this about the general population engaging in fat-shaming: what does it
say about vegan advocates when we participate in the same behaviors in pursuit
of some converts? We know that the research affirms that it is not an effective
form of advocacy. We know that it contributes to self-loathing in a way that
that could prove to be fatal. Even if it were effective, should
a community that is founded on principles of compassion and justice be perpetuating
messages that could have such dire consequences?

So a possible mental checklist to ask yourself before you give dietary advice to anyone
in regard to weight loss…
1. Was this advice specifically solicited from you?
2. Are you from a professional background in which your advice would be appropriate
and expected?
3. Are you knowledgeable in the most current research regarding persuasive
motivation? Are you trained as a counselor?
4. Do you have a relationship with the person with whom you’d like to offer advice,
for example, a close friendship or a professional engagement, in which you would
fully understand the person’s background and challenges?
5. Are you able to give advice without using a fear- or shame-based approach?
6. Everything is moot if you cannot honestly answer #1 in the affirmative.
7. Even if you can answer #1 in the affirmative, you must still tread very,
very carefully.

If you answer no to any of these, seriously consider if you should be dispensing dietary advice.

Last, can we honestly present veganism as a panacea for obesity? How about the
different iterations of a plant-based diet – low fat, fruit-based, high-carb,
whatever: what are the consequences when something that already seemed so difficult and socially isolating to so many just got saddled with a bunch of
restrictions? What happens when we intertwine our social justice movement with the
language and culture of dieting, something has so many harsh and regressive associations in so many minds?

A
plant-based diet can offer some real physical benefits, especially in the realm
of cardiovascular health and the many advantages of eating a plant-rich diet
that is low in saturated fats. As vegans, though, should we assign ourselves
the role of diet coach-slash-drill sergeant? I don't have my answers yet but my thought right now is that unless we are very mindful and sensitive about the misogynistic, hateful messages popular culture saturates us with, we should seriously question if this is in the best interest of individuals and the vegan movement.

Wednesday, August 24, 2016

Co-founder of Vegan Publishers and
professor of Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine, Dr. Casey Taft is an internationally recognized expert
in the area of violence and trauma, particularly in the areas of domestic
violence and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder among military populations. With
his academic and professional background, Dr. Taft is uniquely suited to help
society at large connect the dots between eating animals and continuing cycles of
violence as well as helping the vegan community develop more effective
approaches for our outreach. As such, Casey is also the author of Motivational Methods for Vegan Advocacy: A Clinical Psychology Perspective, an acclaimed book I have seen so many
people singing the praises of but I have not had a chance to read yet. (A
review will be forthcoming once I do, though!) We are always looking for the most effective advocacy approaches and Motivational
Methods explores this not from opinion or dogma but from results-driven strategies Casey
has drawn from clinical psychology models to encourage lasting behavior change. For all he is doing to create a more compassionate world, I am honored to feature Casey Taft as this week's Vegan Rock Star!

1. First of all, we’d love to hear your
“vegan evolution” story. How did you start out? Did you have any early
influences or experiences as a young person that in retrospect helped to pave
your path?

I believe that I was always a vegan at heart but I was
conditioned out of it as a young person. I often felt I had to force myself to
eat animal flesh, and I couldn’t eat seafood or anything where it was obvious I
was eating an animal. But sadly, it wasn’t until my immune system was totally
destroyed during grad school that I experimented with a plant-based diet. I was
plant-based (and gluten free) for about 8 years or so and my health problems
resolved. I finally made the decision to truly go vegan when a vegan friend
called me out on it while at a trauma conference. I’m really lucky that my wife
agreed to go vegan with me.

2. Imagine that you are pre-vegan again: how could someone have talked to you
and what could they have said or shown you that could have been the most
effective way to have a positive influence on you moving toward veganism?

Throughout the entire time that I was “plant-based” I
thought I was actually vegan and didn’t realize until later that veganism isn’t
a diet. Like any other diet, I sometimes cheated a little and had dairy. If
anyone had talked to me about what veganism really was during that time, or
talked to me about ethics and what we do to non-human animals, that very well
may have helped tip the scale for me much earlier. This is why I constantly
urge other animal advocates to be assertive in their advocacy and to not be afraid
of asking others if they’re interested in going vegan.

3.
What have you found to be the most effective way to communicate your message as
a vegan? For example, humor, passion, images, etc.?

With clarity and honesty. Others know when we’re
bullshitting them, and others can handle the truth so long that we’re
presenting it in a way that is not overly confrontational. I am matter of fact
about the harm we do to non-human animals and this sometimes hits home with
others if they’re ready to hear the message. I always try to deliver the
message in a way that will maximize the likelihood the other person will
respond. Part of the art of animal advocacy is assessing the situation and
determining the best message and best approach for any given person at their particular
level of readiness for change at that moment in time.
4. What do you think are the biggest strengths of the vegan movement?

The biggest strength is the diversity of the movement. There
is not one singular message that will reach everyone. It will take many
messages put out there by those from all walks of life who operate within
various social and political contexts. If we’re going to have a vegan world, it
will happen because of those on the ground who are effectively communicating
the vegan message and changing hearts and minds, and a pro-intersectional
movement that brings in others who are fighting various forms of injustice
gives us our best chance at having the kind of impact that we need to have.

5.
What do you think are our biggest hindrances to getting the word out
effectively?

What immediately comes to mind is passivity and fear. Too
many animal advocates are so fearful of being viewed as the “angry vegan” that
they silence themselves. It’s okay if not all advocates are going out and
directly confronting people about their animal use, but the more that we can be
proud to be vegan, and unapologetic in our advocacy, the more people will hear
our message and the greater change we will see.

This fearful advocacy is also promoted by mainstream animal
groups who often fail to promote our animal use as an issue of justice, and
instead opt for asking others to simply reduce the harm they do to animals,
which does nothing to challenge the speciesism that’s at the very heart of the
problem.

6.
All of us need a “why vegan” elevator pitch. We’d love to hear yours.

“I’m vegan because we have no need to be eating or using
animals. The great harm we do to animals is all completely unnecessary.” There
is no valid argument against this.

7.
Who are the people and what are the books, films, websites and organizations
that have had the greatest influence on your veganism and your continuing
evolution?

As a vegan book publisher, I’ve learned a ton from our own
books, since I read all of them. Circlesof Compassion: Connecting Issues of Justice (with Vegan Street’s Marla Rose
as a contributor!) [Ed. note: Woot!] stands out to me as particularly influential because
I learned about so many different dimensions of veganism.

When I first went vegan, I just tried to learn the basics
and how to counter the common justifications people use to continue to consume
non-human animals. I then gravitated more towards animal rights books to figure
out my own “theoretical model” of advocacy. More recently, I feel that I’ve learned
the most from pro-intersectional animal advocates and I hope that I will keep
on learning about how to better understand others and their experiences until
the day that I die.

I’ve also been heavily influenced by folks on social media
pages such as our own Vegan Publishers’ Facebook page. I interact with
vegans and non-vegans every day and regularly field inquiries and challenges
related to veganism. So I’ve learned a ton simply by navigating within this
community trying to effect positive change. More than anywhere else, here is
where I have been able to put my psychology skills into practice by helping
others go vegan.

8.
Burn-out is so common among vegans: what do you do to unwind, recharge and
inspire yourself?

I’m lucky that I have my amazing 3-year-old daughter to hang
out with. She makes it hard to get too stressed out. When I do need a break or
to unwind, we will have a lovely picnic together under a tree at our favorite
nearby back yard park that nobody seems to know exists except for us, or we
will take a long walk to the beach. She always cracks me up and makes it very
hard for me to stay stressed out for very long. She inspires me to keep
fighting for a vegan world.

9. What is the issue nearest and dearest to your heart that
you would like others to know more about?

Prevention of violence is the
issue that I’ve focused on the most in my life. In my day job, I work in the
area of domestic violence prevention, and I am the lead developer of the only
program shown to be effective for this problem. What I would really love is for
others to have a more expansive view of violence prevention to include not only
survivors of domestic violence, but other forms of interpersonal violence, as
well as violence towards non-human animals, racism and other forms of oppression,
the violence we inflict upon the planet, and so on. When I go to anti-violence
conferences, most are only focusing on one small part of the problem without
recognition that various forms of needless violence are all inter-connected
with similar root causes.

10. Please finish this sentence: “To me, being vegan is...”

… the least we can do and a good
starting point for fighting all forms of injustice.

Friday, August 19, 2016

On Friday of last week, John and I were talking about this-or-that trolling
comment of the day (it honestly happens so much, I don’t remember the specific
incident) and John had the brilliant idea of Troll Week. From there, it all
kind of came together. We’ve spent the last week mining the depths of our
social media to bring a new winning (?) comment to light each day and have just
generally explored the idea of online trolling. Monday morning, I thought about
capping the week off with an interview with Dr. Casey Taft, Professor of
Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine, co-founder of Vegan Publishers and author of the widely acclaimed Motivational Methods for Vegan Advocacy: A Clinical Psychology Perspective. As an internationally recognized expert in the study of trauma,
Dr. Taft understands the importance of acknowledging and ending our violence
towards other animals as a way to build a more compassionate world. He will
also be joining me next week as my featured Vegan Rock Star. I am so glad that
he could join us this week on such short notice and share his professional and
personal insights and wisdom with us.

First, how would you define a "troll"?

A troll is someone who posts only to get a rise out of others.

Are there any
obvious markers of trolling behavior online?

The most obvious marker is if they frequently post
"BACON" in all caps.

What if it's
not all caps? Just kidding. Is there anything else that strikes you as an
obvious sign someone is engaging in trolling?

It's kind of hard to
put it into words, to be honest. One needs to feel things out and determine
whether or not the person is making an honest attempt to engage in discussion,
or just attempting to inflame a conversation.

Conversely,
what are some more subtle strategies of trolls?

More subtly, some trolls will attempt to derail and
sidetrack a discussion in an attempt to take it away from an important ethical
issue. For example, rather than discuss the fundamental question of whether we
have any need to be killing and consuming non-human animals (we don't), a troll
would like to change the conversation to focus on plants rights or the diets of
early humans. This way, the troll and their target can engage in pointless
debate for hours while never discussing the important issues.

I see vegans
falling for this a lot, the moving of the goal posts. I do myself when I'm not paying attention as well. What do you recommend
doing as soon as you notice this happening? Just bring the conversation back?
Is there any advantage to pointing it out, like "I see what you're doing
there"?

Yes, I recommend
bringing it back to the core ethical issues and avoid going down that road to
nowhere.

Knowing what
you know about human psychology and motivation, what strategies do you
recommend for being able to shift a trolling comment into a more meaningful
interaction that could result in a positive outcome, for example, a person
seriously considering what you have to say?

If we are talking about online, I think it's really
important to keep in mind that our audience is larger than the individual troll
we're interacting with. Often, there are many other "lurkers" who are
witnessing the interaction, and our response to trolls can make a big
difference in how we are perceived. It's a good rule of thumb to never give in
to our inclination to jump down the troll's throat. If we can respond assertively
and non-aggressively, we can show others that we are fully rational and
composed when we present our vegan view. There will also be times, however,
when the discussion has reached an impasse and we will just have to let the
troll know that there isn't really any point in continuing an unproductive
conversation.

Great point
and this leads to my next question: Many of us struggle with wanting to get the
last word in even when we know that it's futile. When should you know that
enough is enough and there isn't the likelihood of a transformative dialogue
with someone?

This is really the challenge for us advocates: to learn
to diagnose the situation and determine our best approach and when to call it a
day. When it seems that both people in the discussion have stopped listening
and are just trying to argue their point of view, that's a good sign that the
discussion is not productive.

Have you had
any experiences that come to mind where you wrote someone off as a troll but
were pleasantly surprised? What do you attribute that turnaround to?

I really try not to do this and I work to give everyone
the benefit of a doubt, but I see others make this mistake all of the time! So
often I see others assume that someone is trolling, probably because they're
burnt out from dealing with so many of them. They come to assume that anyone
asking a somewhat naive question is just trying to piss them off. This is
something that I teach my patients as a psychologist; we should try not to
assume the intentions of others, and if we assume anything, we should assume
the best in their intentions.

I see this a
lot too, especially on social media. People might be asking a question, not to
undermine or get a rise out of anyone, but because they are genuinely curious
and I've seen vegans can get very aggressive and angry with their questions.
Most people don't realize how much passive-aggression and trolling vegans
receive so they write us off as a bunch of really angry people. I think it's a
good rule of thumb to take give people the benefit of the doubt if you don't
know any better at least at first. Is there a good way to let your fellow
vegans know that they should chill out? Is modeling a better example our best
tool for this?

There may be times
when it is a good idea to say, "Let's hold on! I think John is sincere in
wanting to know more about this. Let's give him the benefit of a doubt."
Other times I will just delete the negative comments and try to engage
directly with the false troll.

Let's talk
about real life, in-person trolls! From family members to co-workers, many of
us have to deal with people who undermine and insult us and what we stand for
in life, some who are passive-aggressive and others who blatantly
attack. Many of us who are activists have also had the experience of the
"drive-by" troll, those who use the hit-and-run approach of saying
something like "Get a life!" as they speed-walk past us at a protest. I know that
this is a HUGE topic, but do you have any advice for dealing with an in-person
troll? Does it differ from how you'd approach trolling from a stranger
online?

I think this depends on who the person is and how
important it is to us if we want a continued relationship with them. Sometimes
we need to decide that it's not healthy for us to continue to interact with
someone who we feel is attempting to bully or upset us, and we need to set
boundaries and limits. Other times, if it's someone who we want a continued
relationship with, we need to find ways to express to them how their behavior
makes us feel, and hope that they will listen to and validate us. In all cases,
though, we have to make sure that we're really taking care of ourselves and are
not allowing others to abuse us. That's obviously not good for us or for the
animals who we advocate for.

Self-care is
so important for sustainability. So another question for you: what is an
example of vegans trolling? When, if ever, is it justified?

I will tell you a secret. I actually troll non-vegans on
occasion. The way that I do this is to post provocative things on social media.
They are always truthful, mind you, but I know that it will shake up some
folks. For example, if we post something to the effect that one cannot claim to
be an animal lover while eating animals, we get a big backlash on our page from
dog and cat lovers. The reason we do this is because some people really do need
a bit of a jolt of reality for them to question whether their behavior matches
their beliefs. Secondly, when we do this, our posts go a lot more viral because
of all of the angry comments and shares, which then causes our posts to show up
on the newsfeeds of their friends. I know for a fact that we've helped many
people go vegan as a result of our troll posts because we get many messages
from those asking for help in their transition after such posts.

I guess I
don't call that trolling but being provocative. Potato, potahtoe and all that.
Okay, last question. Burnout is such a real danger to vegans: do you have
any general mental health tips for those of us who engage with the public as animal
advocates? Sometimes it can feel so soul-crushing.

Yes, try not to let yourself go to that dark place where
you feel like everyone sucks. I think most advocates know this place I'm
referring to. When we don't set boundaries and limits, when we don't take good
care of ourselves, and when we don't know when to take a break from the trolls
and the conflict, that's when we go to that dark place. Self-care in animal
advocacy may sound cliché but it's really important if we are going to be
effective advocates. It can be hard to give others the benefit of a doubt when
we're in that dark place, and it's also hard to join with others in helping
them change if we think that everyone is terrible.

Thank you,
Casey! I so appreciate your time and all you do! Thanks for participating in
Troll Week. :)

Wednesday, August 10, 2016

I promise I will be mature. I promise I will not refer to you as an (arm)pitmaster
as I did on my Facebook post
as I have cooled off a bit and as I have nothing really against armpits per se
as they serve an important and useful function in the world. Some consider the axilla an area on the body worthy of
fetishizing. This is neither here nor there. I just didn’t want to jumble
armpits up with the likes of you, Mr. Ho, as it is unfair to one of our most hardworking
sweat gland locations.

Now I should add the obligatory trigger warning to anyone else reading this
letter as depictions of gratuitous violence featuring you and the animals you
slice up are forthcoming. I should also add that the inevitable vegans who will
grasp at their faux-pearls at my lack-of-helping-the-cause with this open
letter can, I don’t know, concentrate on their own efforts.

Now that we got that out of the way, let’s talk, Mr. Ho.

You were brought to my attention yesterday, when I innocently clicked on a link
in my aggregated vegan Google alerts. The link was to an article about the
success of a Brooklyn-based seitan company called Monk’s Vegan Smokehouse and because it was in the mainstream outlet
Gothamist, in order for everything to be fair and balanced and potentially clickbait-y,
of course conventional flesh-slingers had to be quoted as well. For the most
part, your brethren were gracious and showed courtesy. Not you, Mr. Ho. When
asked about the concept of vegan BBQ, you took off your pitmaster gloves (I
imagine you wear gloves and I imagine you took them off with what you consider
panache) and issued forth this stunning quote: “Vegan BBQ is as nonsensical of
a term as pork-chop sushi or composing a garden salad out of candy bars. BBQ
centers around the philosophy of contextual communal feasting. Smoked seitan is
violently antithetical to that. Rather than call to mind the excessive feasting
of laborers at the end of the fall harvest, it's an anemic dietary constraint.
Rather than a celebration of abundance, it's a solution to a problem no
one wanted solved.”

Wow.

Wow.

I meant it when I said that your quote was stunning. I was, quite literally,
stunned, and as someone who tracks the public response to veganism as part of my job, that is saying
something. Let’s dissect this cumbersome quote line by line like one of “your” hogs, Mr. Ho,
but with a lot less gristle and viscera and no unnecessary violence. Rolling up
my sleeves as I have no pitmaster gloves…

“Vegan BBQ is as nonsensical of a
term as pork-chop sushi or composing a garden salad out of candy bars.”

Why? Because you say so? Because you lack vision and you are a traditionalist
who does not allow for adaptation and re-interpretation in your worldview? Is
that why vegan barbecue is, as you say, nonsensical? If vegan barbecue is indeed
nonsensical, is it in the first meaning of nonsensical, “conceived
or made without regard for reason or reality” or the second, “showing or marked
by a lack of good sense or judgment,” because both sound like opinion to me,
not something grounded in anything resembling fact. Who knew meat-carvers could be so emotional?

Personally, I am very grateful for people who do not accept the status quo of
traditions as they were handed down and have had the confidence and the
imagination to leave behind the customs that are predicated on violence and
harm. Further, are the dead animals you barbecue covered with maguey leaves
before they are set aflame in a hole in the ground, Mr. Ho, as in keeping with
the original tradition? My good sir, please don’t tell me you are selling
something that does not adhere to that exact preparation protocol and still
referring to the flesh as “barbecue”. It is an abomination! It’s an act of
aggression! It is just this side of veganish! Further, I hope you don’t think
that all barbecue is the same when there are regional BBQ preparations that
vary throughout the southern U.S, as well as Kansas City, Texas, Maryland and
Chicago-style BBQs to name a few. If there can be all these different BBQ
traditions just in the U.S., why can there not be a vegan one or even several
vegan ones? It sounds to me like you don’t respect the art of the BBQ at all,
Mr. Ho, and are sorely lacking in creativity. You have angered the BBQ gods!

“BBQ centers around the philosophy
of contextual communal feasting.”

So many fancy words, two of
which are completely superfluous, to convey that BBQ is about sharing a meal
together. Again, can vegans not feast together? Must roasted animal flesh be
present for it to be an official Ho-approved bacchanal? The BBQ gods are
angered again.

I have attended and hosted many community meals wherein no animals were
sacrificed, a.k.a., vegan potlucks. To me, they felt like community gatherings
and feasts. Alas, no smoldering corpses were present. I suppose they are now null-and-void
in your view. Please validate my
existence, Mr. Ho! Though I honestly don’t know how anyone could still have
an appetite with this happening near them.

“Smoked seitan is violently antithetical
to that.”

Again, why is smoked seitan antithetical to a community feast? Because you say
so? You seem to be fond of making blanket pronouncements and
having them stand in the place of fact. Seitan, also known as wheat gluten, has
its origins in the Buddhist practice of nonviolence and was first referenced in
the Qimin Yaoshu, a Chinese
agricultural text written in the sixth century. Surely you are not implying
that Buddhists who have shared communal meals for centuries with seitan and without dead animals feasted together in a way that was and is illegitimate.
That would be, at the least, culturally insensitive and at the worst, highly
arrogant. Seeing as the name of your business has the word “arrogant” in it,
though attached to the sensitive animals who are slaughtered for your living, I will assume
it is the latter. Also, should you be the one using the word “violently”
as though it’s a pejorative after having posed for the above photo?

“Rather than call to mind the excessive
feasting of laborers at the end of the fall harvest, it's an anemic dietary
constraint.”

Okay, I could harp again on your opinions stated as fact, but I’m getting bored
with that. I hope you are, too, and will adopt a different rhetorical style. Instead,
I will ask you to please consider exhibit A, B, and C before you wax rhapsodic
about the experience of laborers again.
Or are you only interested in the golden-hued vision you have of our glorious
past? Could you be laboring under a romanticized pastoralism? I hope you will
click on those links to get a better sense of the lives of modern agricultural
workers. But, but, but, you and your
fellow flesh fetishists might sputter, I
only buy free-range, organic, coddled, massaged noble beasts who have but one
bad day…To that I have to ask, Who is the sentimentalist now? And, yeah,
I’m calling bullshit on that.
Are the laborers treated better? Most likely, considering that working in
industrial agriculture is as dangerous, low-paid, exploitative and degrading a
job as they come, they are treated better. Is this the bar, really as low as they come,
one that you want to really boast about vaunting over, though?

As per the “anemic dietary-constraint,” you get points for your purple prose
but I must deduct more points for your lack of vision and awareness of the abundance
and variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts, legumes and herbs available to
us. How sad for an alleged culinary artist to be so limited in inspiration and
sensuality. The BBQ gods, they are pissed.

I’m running out of steam, but this last pithy remark, oh, it’s a doozy.
“Rather than a
celebration of abundance, it's a solution to a problem no one wanted solved.”
For real, Mr. Ho, are you punking us? Yes, no one wants the “problem” of
needless violence and suffering solved. No one at all. No one wants the “problem”
of workplace exploitation solved. No one at all. No one wants the “problems” of
water pollution,
water scarcity,
air pollution
and climate change
that are inextricably tied to animal agriculture solved at all, certainly not the future generations who will inherit this mess. Why would
we want any of these problems solved when we could be sitting around a smoking pig's corpse in Brooklyn and picking
our teeth with small-batch dental floss, ranting about seitan and patting
ourselves on the back for being awesome, if completely narcissistic and
oblivious, BBQ pitmasters?

Mr. Ho, you are the living manifestation of everyone’s dinner
party-meets-Portlandia nightmare that unsuspecting, unlucky-as-hell people get
seated next to and are forced to hear blather on and on about your sentimental version of BBQ culture of yore and history and sociology and
philosophy and veganism and whatever random thing you pull out of your hipster ass and, speaking of your hipster ass, I am
betting $100 in craft beer that you have at least two or three deeply regrettable tattoos.

)

You had to be this cold-hearted and psychopathic looking and be photographed
doing whatever sick thing it is you’re doing to this tortured body with a
FREAKING CIGAR in your mouth? Because it wasn’t mean-spirited and obnoxious looking enough
without the cigar. Smoked seitan did not cause this problem. Human arrogance did.

Get help. And buh bye.

Sincerely,

Marla Rose

PS – Seriously, I mean it, get help. I am an optimist so I still believe it’s
possible that you can be reformed. That may just be an anemia-fueled fanciful
notion of mine, though.PPS – You
should be paying for the exorcism of my laptop I'll need to have now
that I saved your demonic photos to my desktop even briefly.PPPS – The BBQ gods really hate you.

Thursday, August 4, 2016

Okay, so
somehow this video came across my
eyes and I watched the video and even though I was prepared to get all rage-y,
I fell in love! (Even if I had to forgive them for their very wrong position on tempeh, though I may also have to face that only about four of us on the planet are actually fans of the stuff.) Lacie and Robin are a couple who have been together for 20
years and have gone vegan together in more recent years. They are both from
comedy backgrounds and this is evident in the wonderful rapport they have
together and use to tackle all kinds of subjects on their YouTube channel, from
what does LGBTQIA mean exactly
to simple steps you can take to help create better gun control.
Oh, plus vegan videos, too! (And they’ve made a film together!)
Their affectionate, warm chemistry, candor, maturity and refreshing lack of clickbait-y
behavior made me so happy, especially given the often-toxic vegan
representation on YouTube. We need to replace all the screechy, look-at-me vegans
with more Lacie and Robins. Get off my lawn!!! Oh, and please subscribe to their YouTube channel and follow them on Facebook.

1. First of all, we’d love to hear your
“vegan evolution” story. How did you start out? Did you have any early
influences or experiences as a young person that in retrospect helped to pave
your path?

It’s amazing as
we’re thinking about it, but neither of us have early memories of being
attracted to vegetarianism or veganism. We were both major animal lovers but it
never occurred to us that that had anything to do with what we were eating. As
adults, we dabbled in vegetarianism on and off but it wasn't until we met
our friend, Barry, a vegan, who we love and admire for his all-around
badassery, that we became open to it. He's always unassuming, and he never
talked about being vegan when we met him. He just WAS that and we sort of
watched and asked questions out of curiosity every now and again. Then,
one night, we were surfing Netflix and we happened upon “Vegucated”,
which we had always avoided like the plague, because we knew if we really
faced the reality of what we were participating in, we wouldn't be able to eat
meat anymore. But, that night, because of Barry, we were open to
watching.

2. Imagine that you are pre-vegan again: how
could someone have talked to you and what could they have said or shown you
that could have been the most effective way to have a positive influence on you
moving toward veganism?

Robin: I don't
think there's any way I would have been convinced to change, except
for seeing what happens to the animals.

Lacie: Yeah,
“Vegucated” was great because it lures the viewer into going along for the ride
of whether people can go vegan for six weeks, and then, with a very
light touch, actually, slips in two minutes of graphic imagery from a
factory farm. That was that for us. We immediately looked at each other and
said, “It’s over.”

3. What have you found to be the most effective
way to communicate your message as a vegan? For example, humor, passion,
images, etc.?

Robin:
We come from a stand-up comedy background so we always like to use
humor to get the point across. We’ve done a couple of comedy videos on being
vegan on our YouTube channel,
“Lacie and Robin”, and we’re gonna be doing them more regularly because, hey
we’re vegan. That’s what we do: we talk about it non-stop. But, we aim to be
“safe” vegans, who aren’t going to try to convert you and make you feel guilty.
One of the missions of our channel is to build bridges for people who wanna
know more about veganism without feeling judged. We see ourselves as a place
for people who maybe don’t necessarily want to become vegan but are just
curious about it. We wanna be clear that people don’t have to become fully
vegan to make small changes in their lifestyles that help the cause.

Lacie: We
believe that making people feel guilty or wrong for eating animals is
counterproductive.
4. What do you think are the biggest strengths of the vegan movement?

Lacie: The food
is beginning to taste a whole lot better. There's a company named Beyond Meat now, that
makes chicken that's so delicious and convincing, I actually it eat it out of
the pan while I'm cooking it. That's amazing to me. This is what will
begin to bring more people over. Lots of people aren't happy about the
notion of hurting animals but they're not willing to give up delicious foods
and they're not health nuts. Vegan "mayo" and "butter"
are every bit as good as the dairy versions. Restaurants are popping up in
L.A. that serve great vegan food. While we've become healthier eaters in
the four years since we've become vegan, we still eat plenty of fake meats
and cheeses. And, since it's all about the animals for us, we probably always
will. So, these things matter to us a lot.

5. What do you think are our biggest hindrances
to getting the word out effectively?

We sometimes
give ourselves a bad reputation by proselytizing. Nobody wants to be told
what to do. That creates resistance and fear. The first vegan video we put up
was called "Why Are Vegans So Annoying?"
And, one of the jokes in it is that we vegans can never seem to get
through a party without bringing it up. It's practically
impossible because we genuinely care about the cause. But, no one
wants to hear about death, taxes or veganism. We're better off being
great examples.

6. All of us need a “why vegan” elevator pitch.
We’d love to hear yours.

The sacrifice
is nothing compared to the reward. Living a do-no-harm lifestyle has a hundred
magical consequences you can never know unless you try it.

7. Who are the people and what are the books,
films, websites and organizations that have had the greatest influence on your
veganism and your continuing evolution?

Bill Clinton's
being vegan didn't hurt. And, it's totally encouraging that Scott Jurek,
who won the ultra-marathon multiple times is vegan. In terms of films, we've
talked a lot about "Vegucated" - a fun movie with a very light touch
on the horrors of factory farming. "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead"
was a great watch and a real eye-opener with regard to the health benefits of
being vegan. It was really about the benefits of eating more fruits and
vegetables but the outcomes for the participants, all of whom started with
pretty serious health conditions, were plain undeniable.

8. Burn-out is so common among vegans: what do
you do to unwind, recharge and inspire yourself?

If we ever feel
the slightest temptation, we think about the animals. We also like to
drink beer and watch "Full Frontal with Samantha Bee."

9. What is the issue nearest and dearest to
your heart that you would like others to know more about?

Lacie:
I think sometimes people think that killing a cow, pig, etc. is
not such a big deal if the animal has been free-range and allowed to live a
reasonably natural life. But, factory farming means that animals never have
anything like the sweetness of a natural life. These are fantasies created
by marketing that have no relationship to reality. This includes dairy animals
who, arguably, have even worse circumstances than meat animals.
10. Please finish this sentence: “To me, being vegan is...”